Springboard

To drive innovative thinking, there’s real value in having both insider and outsider perspectives collaborating. Insiders likely have a deep understanding of their consumer, category, and competencies. But that expertise can become self-limiting, as their ideas are colored by their shared filters. Blending that expertise with forward thinkers who aren’t constrained by preconceived notions is a winning combination when it comes to driving innovative and actionable thinking.

Effective innovation is one important way to keep organizations healthy and thriving, and their cultures invigorated. You see examples of innovation in all types of companies – those putting a new twist on an old category (think scent boosters in laundry detergent), a completely new business model and go-to-market strategy for basic, everyday items (Dollar Shaving Club), or creating entirely new categories, like biofeedback products, smart watches and solar vehicles.

Our clients are some of the largest global consumer products and services providers in the world, collectively spending billions of dollars (and euros, renminbi, yen) to actively monitor consumers’ behaviors, attitudes and relationships with their products, competitors’ products, and aspects of their lives that might yield valuable insights.

Uncovering insights that have potential as product improvements or as new products is just the first step; the next is articulating those insights back to consumers in a way that connects them to the concept in meaningful and relevant ways.

Collaboration. It’s a simple concept, but are you implementing it? You can leverage the diverse perspectives your team offers to thoroughly mine potential consumer insights, product innovation opportunities and advertising strategies.

So what? That’s the first question I ask when potential clients come to us with a new product or service idea. Typically, I’ll ask it more delicately, but my point is, can you clearly articulate what’s in it for the customer? Very often, entrepreneurs or inventors talk about the technology behind an idea, or all the attributes and features it has. The challenge is reframing that—think about it from the end user’s point of view, and go beyond saying what your product or device does, but what it does for me. What are the unique benefits your idea can offer potential users, and is that something you can uniquely own?

Opening up a challenge or problem to a wide range of participants, or crowd-sourcing, is a popular way to generate new product ideas, the thinking being that the more minds working on the problem, the better.

However, we’ve found that while crowd-sourcing produces a vast mix of perspectives, the quantity of ideas doesn’t always equal quality. Brainstorming in a controlled, collaborative environment is a more effective approach to getting well-thought-out ideas versus open innovation crowd-sourcing which generates a mass of individual input which you then have to spend time sifting through for the actual useful, pertinent and inspiring ideas.

Jon Hall, Managing Partner of SpencerHall, discusses a revolutionary new innovation process, called Transforum, which streamlines the product development process, significantly decreasing time-to-market, while increasing the potential for blockbuster products.